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Smoking
Smoking is becoming a Pennsylvania Issue * Some in Phili are working now (March 2005) to ban smoking in all public buildings. * Story in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review on a possible statewide smoking ban on March 15, 2005. Insights Allegheny Council's smoking ban, 14-1 vote in September, 2006 After several hours of debate, Allegheny County Council adopted a new policy that will ban smoking in nearly all public places, effective late December, 2006. The measure awaits a signature from County Executive Dan Onorato. Harrisburg's smoking ban from May, 2006 * Smoking on a city playground in Harrisburgh costs a $50 fine. * All city buildings have a smoking ban. All city workers who smoke must go outside to light up. * The phase-in period went to 90 days. * The ordinance is difficult to understand and even harder to enforce. * "How do you stop people from smoking on a playground? We can't get people to pick up after their dogs." * Russ Diamond and a contrast with Lynn Swann on smoking laws * Bill Ogden, gym owner, candidate on smoking and choice from 2006 * Smoking-plank-freedom * Smoking-planks-MN-Gov-debate from Minnesota in October, 2006 * Smoking-plank-Pitt-News editorial about the state ban in September 2007 Details * Smoking at Pittsburgh International Airport can't occur after January 1, 2007. The Allegheny County Airport Authority approved a ban on smoking inside the facility. Smoking will be restricted to 15 feet beyond entrances from the Landside building. Links * Tobacco for settlement, companies, advertisements. Media * South Side bingo fined $16,250 over smoking in the P-G in March 2007 * Department of Transportation to Make E Cig Ban on Airplanes Official in E Cigarette Reviews * Zogby Poll Finds 45 Percent Support Making Cigarettes Illegal, October, 2006 * Wheeling's no-smoking ban, covered in the PG from March, 2006 * Allegheny County Council ready to move on smoking ban if state doesn't, Post-Gazette, July, 2006 * Signal Item: Smokers under siege by Jeffrey Widmer, July 12, 2006 -- Pat Sullivan, owner of Sullivan's Pour House in Carnegie, does not smoke. He never has. He is aware, however, of legislation proposed recently that would ban smoking in all public places across Pennsylvania, including Irish pubs like his on East Main Street. The bill picked up steam earlier this month when it gained support from the Pennsylvania Restaurant Association. * State wants smokers to cough up taxes Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, by Paul Peirce, July 16, 2006, Millions of dollars in tax receipts have gone up in smoke in Pennsylvania because the Department of Revenue has yet to crack down on most of the people who avoid paying the state's cigarette excise tax by buying their smokes via the Web. Blogs * http://antirust.typepad.com/my_weblog/2006/12/awesome_new_smo.html from December 2006 about Ohio's anti-smoking law details. * http://carbolicsmokeblog.blogspot.com/2006/10/downtown-office-building-manager.html (joke) * http://antirust.typepad.com/my_weblog/2006/07/direct_challeng.html * http://antirust.typepad.com/my_weblog/2006/07/proof_some_smok.html * http://carbolicsmokeblog.blogspot.com/2006/11/cigar-chomping-rooney-statue-to-be.html * http://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=32959467&postID=116663460603399749 Candy cigarettes Details PA Legislature Set to Gut Tobacco Prevention and Cessation Funding! Tell Them There's a Better Option! In an attempt to arrive at a state budget in September 2009, a budget plan has been proposed that would cut remaining tobacco settlement funds for tobacco prevention and cessation programs by 50%, while imposing no excise tax on harmful smokeless tobacco, cigars and other tobacco products. PA Legislature Set to Gut Tobacco Programs! As the only state in the nation that doesn't tax these "other tobacco products," it's hard to believe our lawmakers would rather cut tobacco programs than tax these dangerous products that are so heavily marketed to our youth. Without this funding, community and state level tobacco prevention and cessation programs, like the toll-free Quitline and local programs that prevent tobacco sales to minors, will become ineffective. Please take action NOW, before it's too late! Tell PA's lawmakers that cutting tobacco prevention and cessation programs is not acceptable. There's a better option. Taxing other tobacco products instead is a win-win, with increased, much needed revenue for Pennsylvania and reduced consumption of these dangerous products. Thank you for helping fight heart disease and stroke in Pennsylvania! Jennifer Ebersole, PA Advocacy Director American Heart Association Melissa Brown, Grassroots Director, American Heart Association Heart Disease and Stroke. You're the Cure.Advocacy Department • 1150 Cnnecticut Avenue, NW, Suite 300 • Washingotn, DC 20036 202.785.7900 • advocacydc@heart.org PA's Anti-smoking bill snuffed in June, 2006 :Source: Pittsburgh Business Times, 6/6/06 by Dan Reynolds, dreynolds@bizjournals.com, (412) 481-6397 x239 A bill that would have mandated smoke-free work places for Pennsylvania businesses with some exceptions was tabled by the Pennsylvania House of Representatives Health and Human Services Committee Tuesday. The Health and Human Services Committee voted 14-14 on the bill. Without a majority committee vote, the measure won't be moving forward to the house floor for a vote any time soon. Clean air activists said after the vote that by not voting for the bill, lawmakers were in effect voting against the Pennsylvania state constitution, which guarantees every resident of the state the right to clean air. "We're very disappointed that the Health and Human Services Committee couldn't pass a bill that could protect the health of thousands of Pennsylvanians," said Greg Hartley, the assistant director of SmokeFree Pennsylvania, a clean air advocacy group based in Swissvale. State Rep. Nick Kotik, a Democrat representing Corapolis and Carnegie voted for the bill as did State Rep. Jake Wheatley, a Democrat representing the Hill District. Michael Diven, a Republican representing Brookline, voted against it. Pat Conway, the CEO of the Pennsylvania Restaurant Association, said his group opposed the bill because it felt the state's existing clean air act was working fine. That act requires restaurants with more than 75 seats to offer a nonsmoking section. "We really don't think it is necessary. More and more restaurants are going smoke free, people are voting with their feet and we don't support additional mandates," Conway said. Hartley countered that as more and more states adopt legislation banning smoking in public places, it sends the wrong economic development message to those considering relocating to Pennsylvania. "We're becoming the ashtray of the Northeast," Hartley said. Links Media * &tml=burg_4pm&ts=T&tmi=burg_4pm_1_03000207102006 WPXI.com - Health - Experts Say 1 Billion Dead From Tobacco By 2100 WASHINGTON -- If current trends hold, tobacco will kill one billion people this century, 10 times the toll it took in the 20th century, public health officials said Monday. Tobacco accounts for one in five cancer deaths, or 1.4 million deaths worldwide each year, according to two new reference guides that chart global tobacco use and cancer. Lung cancer remains the major cancer among the 10.9 million new cases of cancer diagnosed each year, according to the Cancer Atlas. Insights * Laws prohibit smoking around children USA TODAY.com, 11/28/2006 Anti-tobacco forces are opening a new front in the war against smoking by banning it in private places such as homes and cars when children are present. ** Starting Jan. 1, 2007, Texas restricts smoking in foster parents' homes at all times and in cars when children are present, says Darrell Azar of the Department of Family and Protective Services. Vermont, Washington and other states and counties already prohibit foster parents from smoking around children in their homes and cars. Arkansas and Louisiana passed laws in 2006 forbidding anyone from smoking in cars carrying young children. Courts are ordering smoke-free environments in custody and visitation disputes. "We are very rapidly moving to protect children from secondhand smoke," says John Banzhaf, executive director of Action on Smoking and Health. "Even from their own parents and grandparents." Former surgeon general Richard Carmona said in June that children exposed to secondhand smoke suffer an increased risk of respiratory ailments and sudden infant death syndrome. Smokers' rights groups liken banning smoking in private to the "Salem witch hunt," says Gary Nolan, spokesman for The Smoker's Club, Inc. He says secondhand smoke is not dangerous. "If we don't reverse this, they'll be telling us what we can eat and what we can feed our children," Nolan says. Former smoker Bob Mathis, a Democratic state representative in Arkansas, sponsored a law that bars smoking in a car carrying a child young enough to require a car seat. It took effect in July. A violator can be fined $25 but can get out of it with proof of participation in a smoking-cessation program. A similar law took effect in Louisiana in August. "We have laws on the books in every state of the union against child abuse," Mathis says. "This is a form of child abuse." At least six states and some counties prohibit foster parents from smoking when foster children are present, says Kathleen Dachille, director of the Legal Resource Center for Tobacco Regulation, Litigation & Advocacy at the University of Maryland School of Law. "There are times when it's appropriate to regulate what people can do in their home," she says. "The state is responsible for that child." Some courts are ordering parents in custody and visitation disputes not to smoke around their kids. Initially, courts considered restrictions when children had ailments such as asthma that are exacerbated by smoke, says Linda Elrod, a law professor and editor of Family Law Quarterly. Now, they're more willing to restrict smoking even when there are no obvious health problems, she says. It generally comes up when one parent complains about the other's smoking. category: fitness category:wellness category:freedom